The Doctoral Deficiency
by ancarett
Summary: Four men, four doctorates, but none for Howard. That may never change with Sheldon on his committee! Can Leonard, Penny, Howard & Raj deal with angry Buffy fans, harassed university staff & more to secure Howard's Ph.D.? Stay tuned!
1. Chapter 1

"Come on, Sheldon, spit it out!" Leonard demanded as they entered their building on the Caltech campus, the morning still cool and pleasant despite the smog warning already in effect. Certainly the weather couldn't excuse Sheldon's strangely quiet demeanour, Leonard thought, but then, what reasons did Sheldon need to seem unnerving? It was just today was much more unsettling than most days driving his roommate and colleague to campus.

Sheldon darted silent and resentful looks at his roommate as they made their way deeper into Lauritsen.

"You must already know the cause of my discontent," Sheldon finally retorted. "You have, obviously in error!, been ranked above me in the university's annual review."

"What?" Leonard asked and then stopped dead in the hallway, letting a surprised grad student scramble to get past the two of them. "Wait, how do you know what I got in my annual review from Dr. Gablehauser and the dean, anyway?"

"I looked at your paperwork, of course," Sheldon said, dismissing the irrelevance of the question with one wave of his hand.

Leonard scowled. "That was in my locked file cabinet, in my office, right here," he said, gesturing ahead of them down the cheerless corridor punctuated only by closed doors and neglected bulletin boards.

"Child's play," Sheldon smirked airily. "You really should invest in a good lock for that filing cabinet, especially given what you tend to keep in the last hanging folder, you know, the one . . . ."

Leonard groaned. "You didn't?"

Sheldon's smirk grew for a moment as he resumed their path down the hallway of academic offices. "You can think that if you like, Leonard. But we should return to the point of the conversation which is to figure out in what Bizarro universe you can have performed your scholarly duties with more proficiency than I or will you admit to perpetrating a colossal fraud upon your colleagues?"

Leonard stopped in front of his office door and unlocked it. Under the door was shoved an envelope marked "Urgent: Personnel".

Groaning as he opened the manila envelope and slid the single sheet of paper out to read it, Leonard's expression darkened. "Oh, great. Another training seminar notice: health, safety and equity. I'm reminded that I have yet to attend the mandatory sessions. After all these years, you'd think they'd give up."

Sheldon sniffed. "I ignore those. My job is to think, not to perform 'facilitating exercises' with the masses."

Leonard threw the envelope in the trash and the memo onto his desk while Sheldon swept past his roommate and stood with hands on his hips, still obviously not willing to let his initial question drop. Leonard hung his windbreaker on the coathook and made his way around his desk to sit in his office chair.

"I don't suppose you'll accept that I actually can do this job better than you can, Sheldon," Leonard asked wearily.

Sheldon twitched and his brows furrowed. "Again, in what Bizarro universe would this be? Who won the Chancellor's Award, hm?"

Leonard sighed, letting his gaze roll skyward. "And who decided that the speech was a 'pants-optional' ceremony?"

Sheldon crossed his arms and loftily turned his gaze out the window. "So? I still have outperformed you in every way, shape and form that matters in academia, to wit, in research productivity."

Raj popped his head around the corner at the last bit, obviously just on his way into the office as his bright blue jacket was tightly zipped even though there hadn't been a drop of rain. "Yeah, man, ever since I started working with-"

"For," Sheldon interjected.

Raj frowned. "_With_ Sheldon, I've had to admit that he's a publishing dynamo. Really blows you out of the water, Leonard, _despite_ what the final review says. Frankly, your publication record wasn't that much better than mine for this past year," Raj finished up with a commiserating expression.

Leonard glanced back and forth at the two men, incredulously. "You let him see my annual review?"

Sheldon shrugged with a clear lack of concern. "Why not?"

Leonard shook his head in weary resignation as he slumped further back in his chair. "Look, there are a lot of factors that contribute to our standing in the annual reviews. You know that."

Raj nodded with a smile that suggested he was simply humouring Leonard while Sheldon raised one eyebrow in disbelief. "It's not just research and even that has to take into account not only publications, but grants and conferences and all of that. Beyond that, there's still teaching and service."

Sheldon scoffed. "I teach," he huffed.

"You lost all of the students in your graduate seminar before the second week. That doesn't count as teaching, Sheldon," Leonard explained with a note of disbelief.

Raj turned to face Sheldon. "He is right, about that Sheldon. The grad students call you Crazy Cooper and there's a betting pool that on how long before the next poor sucker who's convinced to take you on as their supervisor is committed to a mental hospital or leaves the program."

"Oh, come on," Sheldon protested. "Those were isolated events. Anyway, who signs your paycheck, Koothrappali?"

Raj glanced at the other two men in the room, appearing slightly confused. "Nobody signs my paycheck. I get it electronically deposited."

Leonard sighed as he shook his head. "It's an expression, Raj. I think that Sheldon's reminding you that you owe your current funding to him and that you're supposed to be on his side."

With an angry stare fixed on his roommate, the shorter physicist continued heatedly, "Which, if we're honest here, you really shouldn't be because you're not involved in this at all. In fact, I can't believe that you thought it was appropriate to poke into my annual review in any case!"

Sheldon just shifted his gaze to the far wall of the room, ignoring the others with an airy disdain. Raj finally seemed to cotton onto the tense atmosphere and took the opportunity to escape. "See you later, dude," he hissed to Leonard, as he disappeared back into the hallway.

In his absence, Sheldon let his lower lip stick out in an aggravated pout that Leonard recognized well. His obsessive roommate needed to solve the problem of his unexpectedly inferior standing in the annual reports. Leonard settled back in his chair with an exasperated sigh. "Look, Sheldon," he began, "the dean insisted that to get better than satisfactory standing in the annual review, you had to score well in two of the three criteria: research, teaching and service."

Sheldon waved one hand dismissively. "My teaching's too good for the students in this department, that's just the plain and simple truth. But even if, for some completely unknown reason, my colleagues fail to see that, I see no reason why I should not be esteemed more highly than you!"

Leonard rolled his eyes. "How about service, Sheldon?"

"My research is my service! Service to humanity!"

Again, Leonard shook his head in exasperation. "Not according to the university. Service is what you contribute beyond research and teaching. You know, like sit on faculty committees or serve as someone's thesis reader. I served on two university-wide committees and was part of three doctoral defenses, including one for chemistry. Whereas I believe that this past year, you had the singular distinction in the department of failing to serve on a single university committee. That's worse than Dr. Newton who's been in a complete body-cast for the last four months since his car accident but still managed to contribute to the curriculum and speakers' committees via email. You couldn't even manage to stay on the faculty lounge committee when all they do is rubber-stamp the coffee and magazine budget each year!"

Sheldon's eyes flashed angrily as he leaned forward, "What do you expect when they insisted on keeping subscriptions to _Newsweek_, _The Economist_ and _Time_ instead of buying comics! Why, for those prices, we could have gotten a fair selection of DC _and_ Marvel titles!"

Leonard warded off Sheldon's outrage. With his hands still upraised, he continued. "Look, you need to have at least something on your CV in teaching or service in order for Dr. Gablehauser and the dean to give you a better rating. It's as simple as that. And, no," he added, seeing a cunning expression appear on Sheldon's face, "you can't just make something up. It has to be real."

Sheldon arched an eyebrow dismissively as he made to leave Leonard's office. "Unlike you, I have the highest of professional standards. I'll find something to add as service and get Dr. Gablehauser to revise his review. Just you wait and see!"

Leonard leaned back in his chair, already exhausted even though he'd only been at the office for fifteen minutes. "Yay?" he said weakly.

* * *

The cafeteria was half empty so it was easy to spot Howard, garishly dressed in a green turtleneck and gold short-sleeved vest, and Raj, somewhat more soberly attired in red, white and blue, already at their customary table. "Hi," Leonard offered in a lackadaisical fashion as he dropped his tray into place and slumped into his seat.

"Good to see you, too," Howard said, somewhat snidely.

Leonard rolled his eyes. "Not you, too," he grumbled. "Look, I'm sure Raj has told you how fun my morning's been. Managing Sheldon is a full-time job."

Raj, mouth full of sandwich, could do little but nod with an earnest expression. Whether it was in support of Leonard or Howard, neither of the other men could tell.

Howard stared across the table at Leonard. "You have no idea, do you?"

Leonard's brow furrowed in confusion. "No idea what? Don't tell me you have a problem with my annual review now, too?"

Howard waved one hand dismissively while the other stirred his mixed vegetables. "No, but what you've inspired Sheldon to do, well, _that's_ where I have my problem."

"Huh?" Leonard's response only made Howard splutter.

Raj intervened, having swallowed in the meantime. "You haven't heard, Leonard? It's bad. Very, very bad." Raj's mouth drooped into a mournful grimace as his gaze drifted away from the table.

Leonard glanced back and forth at his friends. "What's so bad? What did I do?"

From over his shoulder, Sheldon's voice answered. "You inspired me to find a service obligation to fulfill. I stopped by the department office and discovered that with Dr. Newton's physiotherapy schedule, he's had to drop some of his service obligations. I volunteered to take on one of the more, erm, _interesting_ duties. I'll be serving as the internal external examiner on a doctoral dissertation in engineering for one of Dr. Arlin's students. One very interesting student, as a matter of fact."

Twisting around in his seat, Leonard gazed up in confusion at his smug roommate. "Um, congratulations?" he offered weakly.

"That does it," roared Howard, throwing down his napkin and picking up his tray, all in an obvious huff.

Sheldon looked after his departing figure as he took his own seat at the table. "Strange," he remarked while arranging his napkins and cutlery (carefully checking for four tines and not three on his fork, and that all were perfectly aligned).

After settling his lunch tray to his satisfaction, Sheldon looked at the other two physicists sitting open-mouthed at the table. "Whatever is the matter with Howard?" he asked in a mild, wondering tone.

Raj huffed incredulously. "How can you ask that, Sheldon, after what you just said?"

Leonard raised a hand to interrupt. "Look, will _someone_ fill me in on what's the matter, here? Why is Howard upset and what does it have to do with Sheldon's sitting on a doctoral defense committee?"

Raj glanced around the room furtively, seeming to assure himself that no one was listening in. He leaned toward Leonard. "Okay, this has been top-secret for a while, you get it?"

Leonard scrunched his nose. "No, but do continue."

Raj sighed. "Howard has been working on his dissertation. He's ready to defend and Dr. Newton was on his committee until Sheldon took over. Now Howard's pretty sure that he's never going to get his doctorate thanks to Sheldon's interfering." The last was said with a pointed glare.

Sheldon looked up briefly from his precisely arranged lunch plate. "What ever do you mean, Raj? I'm sure he'll get his doctorate, _eventually_. It's just going to take a fair bit more work. You know, nothing worth having comes without real effort. And so on and so on."

Leonard took his glasses off and rubbed the bridge of his nose. The effort didn't seem to relieve much stress, however, as his expression remained pained. "Okay, let me see if I got this right," Leonard began. "You, Sheldon, got appointed to Howard's doctoral dissertation committee as your university service work for the year?

Sheldon's smug smile served as an answer but Leonard was clearly still not following everything. He turned toward Raj. "You knew about this?"

Raj's eyebrows jumped. "Well, only for the last year and a bit. I saw his registration form one day when I went over to his house and asked about it. Well, pretty well dragged it out of him, actually." The other physicist carried on in detailing the elements of Howard's thesis program and how he'd been working on it for all these years with no one the wiser (helped, of course, by Sheldon's easy dismissal of anything that Howard and the others did in Applied Physics as just so much Oompa-Loompa-ing).

"His supervisor signed off on his final copy to go to the committee just two weeks ago, so now it's pretty much over except for the defense," Raj finished.

"And you didn't tell us?" Leonard whined at the end of the explanation.

"He made me pinky-swear," Raj admitted.

Sheldon nodded. "Pinky-swears are serious. Still, this is an interesting development. Now that I have a chance to add my views as a member of his committee, it's possible that, with a few months more of work, something passable can come out of his thesis. Isn't this a lucky break? Anyway, I had the graduate office send over a copy this morning. I've already gone through it once and my red pen is a-raring for another run-through, so if you'll excuse me. I'll see you when it's time to go to the Cheesecake Factory. After all, it's Cheeseburger Night!" Ferrying his empty lunch tray back to the clean-out, Sheldon was clearly eager to get back to work which was, in this case, the evisceration of Howard's dreams and ambitions.

Leonard groaned, collapsing forward on the table. His lunch tray lurched away from him. "This is going to be bad, isn't it?"

"You said it," Raj confirmed glumly. "Sheldon is going to skewer him. Instead of defending this term, Howard will be lucky to defend this decade."

Leonard lifted his head from the table enough to nod in agreement. "Is there anything we can do?" he asked.

Raj tilted his head, considering the question. "Short of sending Sheldon on a solo polar expedition, I can't think of anything. You?"

"Me neither," Leonard agreed. Sighing, he levered himself up from the cafeteria table. "Come on. I think we have to go apologize to Howard."

"And maybe stop him from planning to murder Sheldon in his sleep," Raj added.

"Haven't we all dreamed up a few murderous schemes of our own?" Leonard asked, as they dropped off their trays and headed off to Howard's lab space.

Raj had to agree.

* * *

By dinnertime, Howard had cooled off enough that he could sit at a table with Sheldon and not try to strangle the other man. Barely.

Howard's anger bubbled up in the terse, one-word answers he offered to any of the questions Sheldon asked and the oh-so-sarcastic edge to his voice when he gave Penny his order.

Excusing himself from the table, Howard stalked off toward the washrooms while Penny stared after him.

"What's up with Howard today?" she asked the table in general. As Sheldon opened his mouth to answer, Leonard rushed in.

"We found out that Howard's been working on a doctoral dissertation and is almost ready to defend his thesis," Leonard said, then looked uncomfortably at Sheldon sitting beside him. "Or at least, he hopes he is."

"Whoa," Penny said, in obvious surprise, "so it's Dr. Wolowitz now?"

Raj shook his head furiously, glaring meaningfully at Sheldon.

"Or not," Penny concluded.

Sheldon glanced sideways at Leonard, then, with a small smile, explained to Penny, "One of the professors who was assigned to review Howard's dissertation suffered a terrible accident this year and is doing some extensive physiotherapy. So I volunteered to take over his spot on the committee. Needless to say, Howard's dissertation is going to require a great deal of change in order to meet up to my standards. So I'm afraid that the 'almost ready' part of Leonard's statement might not hold true."

Penny regarded Sheldon rather as if he'd spoken in a foreign language. "Huh, okay. Well, that doesn't sound too good now, does it."

Raj stared fixedly at the table and Leonard made an abortive throat-slitting gesture that only Penny could see. "Uh, okay, well, I'll take your orders in, then, won't I? And, erm, have fun."

Penny escaped as Howard returned to the table, fixing Sheldon with a resentful stare as he resumed his seat. Raj sighed and, freed of the constraints Penny's feminine presence made on his voice, said with some exasperation, "Dude, let's just drop it, okay?"

"Sure," Howard replied. "As long as he-" the shorter man paused for an intense stare across the table at Sheldon "-promises to drop the subject."

"Why, certainly," Sheldon said agreeably. "After all, I'm sure we have much better things to discuss. Like tomorrow's comic book release?"

Leonard seized upon the change of subject. "You betcha! I can't wait to get my hands on the latest _Batman Beyond_!"

Raj nodded eagerly as he slurped at his Sprite. "Me, too. But I am not going to pick up the latest _Spider-Man_."

"Agreed," Sheldon pronounced. "I can not forgive Joe Quesada for the atrocities he's inflicted on Peter Parker."

Even Howard loosened up enough to weigh in on this important issue. "As if any man in his right mind would give up marriage to Mary Jane Watson to keep Aunt May alive. I mean, what? The old lady's gotta be 130, amiright?"

Fortunately, answers were cut off as Penny arrived with their appetizers. But the topic of comic releases segued into console games so that the rest of the evening went by fairly painlessly.

At least, that's what Leonard thought until Raj pulled him aside after they paid their bills.

"Dude," he hissed, looking at the ficus plant in the corner so that no sight of a woman could render him mute, "we have to do something to help out Howard. And soon! Before Sheldon ruins everything."

Leonard whispered back, "I know, but what?"

Raj looked around helplessly, catching a glance of a woman coming in the entrance. Whatever he might have said ended with a screech.

Leonard shrugged. "Tomorrow," he mouthed to Raj as they left the restaurant and waved at Howard, already zipping off on his scooter.

"Whatever took you so long?" Sheldon asked. Before either of the other men could respond, he cut them off. "It doesn't matter. Let's get home, Leonard. I have a lot of work to do if Howard's thesis is ever going to be defensible!"

Leonard rubbed his hairline gingerly. The headache that had been threatening for hours was definitely coming home to roost. "Oh, joy," was all he managed as they made their way to his car.


	2. Chapter 2

Tensions ramped up on Thursday as the four of them met up again in the lunchroom. Dr. Gablehauser made one of his rare appearances. "Dr. Cooper! Dr. Hofstadter! Dr. Koothrappali! _Mr._ Wolowitz."

His customary greeting clearly grated on Howard's nerves but the self-assured head of the physics department took no notice of such minutiae. "Dr. Cooper!" he continued, turning to address Sheldon. "I must thank you for taking on the internal external readership of that engineering thesis. Dr. Newton's physiotherapy has him back in the hospital and he would have had a tough time serving in this capacity."

Sheldon smiled with patent insincerity as he waved a hand in seeming dismissal. "Oh, pshaw. I don't mind helping out. You know me, always thinking about the department's best interests."

Dr. Gablehauser opened his mouth to respond, closed it, then tried again. "Yes, erm, well, as I said. It's appreciated and will be reflected in your annual review."

Sheldon leaned forward slightly. "This one?" he asked in a leading tone.

Dr. Gablehauser seemed to consider that for a moment. "Maybe. The reviews haven't all gone on to the dean's office yet and I might be able to do something. Especially as you've been helpful in another way recently. But, enough of that. Must be off! Carry on!"

As he strode out of the cafeteria, Leonard pivoted to glare at Sheldon. "Was that schmoozing?"

Raj chimed in, "It most definitely was."

Sheldon demurred. "I'm just attempting to be more collegial, that's all." His steadfast refusal to meet their gaze suggested that he knew otherwise.

Howard snorted in disgust. "Over my dead body, you are. Which is pretty well what you're doing here, anyway. Dr. Gablehauser may have forgotten that was my thesis that Dr. Newton was reader on but you glommed right onto it. And now you're trying to bury me."

Sheldon raised one eyebrow at Howard's diatribe. "Pause in the piling on of metaphors, there. I had no idea when I went into the office to ask the administrative assistants what service obligations needed filling that they were looking for someone to take over this particular responsibility. Anyway, my sitting on the committee will only help you. I'll bring a trained perspective that's sure to improve your otherwise pedestrian analysis. Consider it serendipity!"

"Serendippity-do-dah," Howard snarked back. "I'm going to go get some lunch but I think I'll take it back to the lab. Somehow, I have no desire to hang out here with you today. Leonard. Raj" Bidding farewell to the other two physicists, Howard's attempt to snub Sheldon failed miserably as the tallest of the friends was already considering his own menu choices.

* * *

After that, Vintage Video Game Night was, unsurprisingly, a colossal bust with Howard leaving before they even got started and Raj soon after. Leonard ended up watching Sheldon play Donkey Kong on the NES emulator and wishing he had gone with Raj.

Penny tried a small intervention on Saturday night when she ran into Sheldon in the laundry room, having overheard the grumbling several times since Tuesday. It being almost 8:30, his laundry was already gurgling away in two washers when Penny lugged her own hamper into the noisy basement room. But Sheldon paid her no mind, hunched over a mass of paper decorated with Post-It notes and scribbled on liberally.

"What's that?" Penny asked, as she started to load up a washing machine with a week's worth of uniforms and casual wear.

"Howard's so-called thesis," Sheldon said in a tone of abstraction as he scribbled out an entire paragraph and drew an arrow over to the margin where he began to write out a series of equations. "And becoming more and more dubious by the minute, may I add."

Penny poured in her detergent and slammed down the lid of her machine, starting the cycle before coming over to peer over Sheldon's shoulder at the defaced document.

"What's it about?" Penny idly asked.

"You wouldn't understand," Sheldon replied automatically, circling a number in a table and writing an emphatic question mark beside it.

Penny leaned back against the folding table Sheldon was using as a writing surface. "Oh, come on, Sheldon. Really? Nothing?"

He looked up enough from the paper to catch her slow, amused expression. "Here," he said tersely. "Read the title page."

Penny accepted the manuscript with a nod, flipping it to the first page of the perfect bound bundle. Her eyebrows went up, then down, and up again.

"No," Sheldon added after half a minute. "Read it aloud."

Penny stared at Sheldon, rather in the manner of a rabbit who'd just been cornered. "Um, okay."

Quickly looking down at the title page, she essayed her best shot. "Post-processing algo-", before Sheldon interrupted, snatching the thesis away from her tentative grasp.

"No, no! It's not all-go, it's al-go, as in algorithms. 'Post-processing algorithms for the analysis of SHARAD radargrams of Martian subsurface surveys.' See? If you can't get past the title, you'll never be able to understand what it's about!"

Penny seemed to consider whether or not this was worth picking a fight with Sheldon. "Okay, so I don't understand all-go, excuse me, algorithms. Or SHARAD whatsits. But I'm betting you don't either. You keep telling me you're a theoretical physicist, Sheldon. What would you know about this stuff?"

Sheldon seemed to inflate with happiness and pride at a chance to explain just how much he really did know about 'this stuff.' "Remember, Penny, that I have _two_ doctorates. And, while, like Oppenheimer, I eschew applied physics in general, a solid grounding in this was part of my extensive education. As well as a great amount of work in mathematics which, of course, is the foundational structure for any real intellectual work."

Penny let her eyes droop as she leaned back against the table. An excited Sheldon continued his explanation as she leaned closer to the wooshing washers and ka-thudding dryers, letting their rhythmic noises drown out his incomprehensible elaborat. . . .

"Penny?"

"Penny?"

"PENNY?"

"Huh?" Penny roused herself to see Sheldon peering directly into her eyes from a very close distance. Without thinking, she scrambled a bit back and sideways until distance had given a more manageable perspective of her neighbour and friend that didn't include a close-up of his iris.

Seeing his disapproving expression, Penny remembered that she'd supposedly been listening to his explanation of something about Howard's thesis. "Um, sorry, Sheldon, but I didn't get a lot of sleep last night," she offered.

Sheldon raised one eyebrow. "Do you, perhaps, have a new partner with whom you engaged in lengthy-" he began before Penny interrupted.

"No! No! Look, I just was up late, erm, reading a book."

Sheldon inexpertly stifled a disbelieving chortle. Penny gave him a dirty look. "I _do_ read."

"Romance novels don't count as reading," Sheldon scoffed.

A washer timer rang out discordantly, forestalling what would likely have been a knockdown argument. Penny satisfied herself with a deadly glare at Sheldon's green-clad back, instead.

Sheldon busied himself with transferring his laundry from washers to dryers. When everything was shifted to his satisfaction in four dryer-loads and with a few t-shirts carefully arranged on hangers, he turned back to face Penny.

"Where were we?" he asked rhetorically. "Oh, don't remind me, we were reviewing the obvious deficiencies in your educational preparation. Although, from what I've seen of Howard's thesis so far, you're not terribly behind him on that front."

"Really," Penny said, equal parts annoyance and surprise. "But isn't this, like, supposed to be the thing that gets him his doctorate?"

Sheldon sniffed. "Well, theoretically, this 'thing' or 'dissertation' as we like to say in academia, is the capstone of a long and rigorous research program that illustrates the level of analysis and argumentation worthy of an independent researcher but, I'm afraid, in Howard's case, this is clearly not up to standards."

Penny's eyebrows shot up and she cocked her head to one side, pony-tails flipping at the quick shift. "Really? You mean, Howard's failing out? That's awful!"

Sheldon let a small smile creep onto his face. "Oh, it won't be so drastic as that. But clearly, I have to say that his supervision has been, well, inadequate. I was brought on board as his internal external in enough time, though, to forestall any tragic fallout."

Penny's worried expression relaxed. "Oh, so you're helping him fix it?"

Sheldon nodded. "Yes, yes I am. Why, with my feedback and another two to three years of work, I'm sure that Howard will have a perfectly defensible dissertation."

Penny blinked as her jaw dropped. "Two to three _years_?

Sheldon's preoccupied but positive, "Uh-hum" left her flabbergasted. As her washer buzzer rang, Penny mechanically shifted the mixed contents of colours and whites into a dryer without much attention paid to the process beyond slamming the door closed and turning the machine on. She was trying to get her head around the idea of something taking two or three more years worth of work. Being an actress? Sure. Being a certified geek? Not so much!

"Excuse me," she managed, "but I think I left the oven on upstairs."

Sheldon sighed. "More sleep deprivation?" But his heart wasn't in the needling and Penny made her escape as he turned back to tearing up Howard's thesis.

* * *

Penny barged into the boys' apartment after a cursory knock. Howard and Raj were sitting on the couch, glum faces staring at the TV while Leonard busied himself in the kitchen.

"Hi, Penny," Leonard chirped. "What brings you here tonight?" His tone was just a little bit too hopeful, Penny thought.

"Not that, Leonard," Penny said emphatically. "It's just, I was down in the laundry room watching Sheldon scribbling all over Howard's thesis."

At this, Howard looked up from his sad consideration of the incomprehensible sci-fi movie playing on the screen to grace Penny with an even more wretched expression. "Aw, great. Let's go from 'destroy Howard's hopes and dreams' to 'beat them into the ground and dance on their graves' why don't we?"

Leonard ambled over from the kitchen, offering Penny a glass of soda which she accepted wordlessly while Raj put a comforting hand on Howard's shoulder, Penny's presence robbing him of any verbal comfort that he might have offered.

Leonard shrugged awkwardly. "I'm sure it's not that bad, is it, Penny?"

She took a gulp and shook her head emphatically. "It's worse."

Howard jumped up from the couch. "I knew it," he spat out while Leonard reached forward a bit uncertainly, giving Penny a look that clearly said _you're not helping_.

She shrugged her own shoulders helplessly. "Look, all I know is that he says Howard has a perfectly defensible whatever-thingy it is-"

Leonard uttered a happy, "Ah, hah!"

Penny glared, "-if he has two or three more years to work on it."

Leonard sank into his chair with a stunned exhalation. "Oh."

Howard was already climbing over the arm of the couch toward the door. "That's it. I'm killing him. I can guarantee I'll do less time for that than he'll try to put me through on this," Howard raved as Raj caught his upper arms, holding him back, with some difficulty, from the doorway.

"Whoa, whoa there, tiger," Penny said, inserting herself between the apartment door and Howard. "Prison for murder is definitely a lot more than two or three years, remember."  
The combined efforts of Penny and Raj seemed to bear fruit. Howard sagged backwards and Raj loosened his hold. "What's the use?" Howard moaned as he returned to his seat on the couch. "I'll never get my doctorate."

Raj darted a glance at Penny, then put a hand over Howard's ear so he could whisper some advice.

Howard turned and looked at him incredulously. "Why, yes, I'd love to wait and get Dr. Newton back on the committee. Do you think I didn't try that? But he emailed me before he went into physio, saying that he was relieved to know my thesis was in good hands with Dr. Cooper. So I can't get him back."

Leonard looked up myopically from the burger wrapper he was methodically shredding. "Why not someone else, then? Sheldon's filling in as an internal external. It just has to be any faculty member in a related field who'll agree to serve. Heck, Raj or I could do it."

Howard shook his head mournfully. "No, my supervisor, Dr. Arlin, knows that you two are my friends. He'd consider it unethical."

Penny's puzzled look brightened. "Well, wouldn't that eliminate Sheldon, too?" she asked.

Howard's despair seemed to deepen. "It's the universal opinion of the engineering faculty at CalTech that Sheldon Cooper is not human and forms no emotional relationships with any other human beings."

Leonard chuckled. "Wasn't his roommate before me an engineer?"

Penny's eyes widened. "The one who painted 'Die Sheldon Die' on the bedroom wall?"

"Yup," Leonard confirmed as Penny shivered slightly.

"Well, I guess that makes sense, doesn't it?," Penny said as she turned to the door. "I've got to go rescue my laundry before Sheldon slingshots it across the street or worse, since I kept falling asleep during his explanation of his qualifications to work on Howard's committee. You have, er, fun trying to figure out this one."

With a casual wave of her fingers belying a look of real concern she shot at Leonard in particular, Penny was gone and, with her, any hopes of a happy evening.

"Kill me now," Howard grumbled, as he sunk lower on the couch.

"It's _Zardoz_, man," Raj said, pointing to the burly, barely-clad, decades-younger but still disconcertingly hairy Sean Connery on-screen. "Wouldn't that kind of be redundant?"

Howard rolled his eyes. "Look, this is why I never told any of you about my dissertation. I mean, yeah, okay, Raj found out, but I was trying to keep it a secret because, you know, if word got out, I knew it would be spoiled. And now look at what's happened."

Leonard nodded. In all honesty, he couldn't disagree with Howard. Neither could Raj, who put a comforting arm around Howard's shoulder in a brief hug. "You know we'll do what we can to try to fix this. But, gotta be truthful, this is Sheldon Cooper and you know how hard he is to manage."

Leonard felt both of their gazes turn on him. "Oh, no," he moaned, as Raj let his eyes open to their widest possible. "I'll try but you guys don't really think there's anything that I can do to get Sheldon to lay off Howard or get off this committee, now, do you?"

Their eyes continued to implore and Leonard buried his head in his hands. Things were just going from bad to worse.


	3. Chapter 3

Later that night, Sheldon sat at his desk, the ghostly light of the monitor giving his face a bluish-glow in the dimly-lit living room. _Zardoz_ had long finished, Howard and Raj had left before Sheldon could even return from his laundry-night activity, and now Leonard was left alone with his roommate.

Leonard had tried distracting himself with stupid Facebook games to no avail. Before his guilty conscience floated an image of Howard's dejected figure leaving the apartment. Despite the bright bravery of his red and yellow outfit, topped off with a pirate belt-buckle, Howard appeared small(er) and diminished, worn down by fears that his dissertation would never see the light of day.

Wandering aimlessly from his own keyboard to the kitchen, to fill a glass of water, take a sip and pour out the rest, Leonard sighed.

"That's the third time," Sheldon said, never moving his gaze from his screen.

"Third time what?" Leonard responded in some confusion, standing by the kitchen island, holding the empty glass before him as if it were a shield.

Sheldon spared a glance from his computer to rake Leonard from dishevelled head to sneakers-clad feet. "Third time this evening that you've gone to the kitchen, poured yourself a glass of water and then thought better of it. You're either suffering from a strange and transient obsession or you're trying to build up the courage to ask me about something. Howard's thesis, I presume."

Leonard half-collapsed against the kitchen counter at Sheldon's words. "Well, yeah, kind of."  
Sheldon's eyebrows rose higher. "As decisive as ever, Leonard."

Sighing slightly, the Texan turned primly in his chair so he was directly facing Leonard. "You have my undivided attention. Fire away."

Leonard felt a little bit like a bug trapped on an entomologist's pin, transfixed by Sheldon's unyielding gaze. "Um, well, you see, it's that, well-"

Sheldon harrumphed. "Get on with it. My patience is not limitless, unlike the queue for Cataclysm Open Beta." This last was said with an accusing look at the Warcraft loading screen on his monitor.

Leonard shook his head abruptly, reminding himself that this was for Howard who, much as he might find him annoyingly smarmy as he tried to talk the pants off of every girl in Pasadena, still was a sort of friend. "It's Howard, yes. He'd like you to step off of the thesis committee. We all would, frankly. Very much."

"I see," Sheldon said.

Leonard waited. Sheldon regarded him unblinkingly.

"Well?" Leonard finally asked, after what had to be a minute of fraught silence.

"Well, what?" Sheldon asked, with an annoyed glance at the still-stagnant loading screen.

"Will you resign from Howard's thesis committee and let us find another physicist or someone from chemistry or geology or something to fill the spot?" Leonard said, his voice rising imploringly on the last part of his request.

"No," Sheldon said. "I will not. And you should thank me for that."

"Why?" Leonard whined in frustration, banging the empty glass on the counter so emphatically that Sheldon winced.

"Careful," Sheldon warned. "It should be childishly obvious, at least if you had greater facility in classical mechanics!, that I am at risk of injury should that glass shatter. I have no wish to end up in emergency with a injury that might reduce my typing speed or gaming efficiency."

Leonard started to apologize, then stifled that sound. "Let's not get off topic, Sheldon," he warned. "Why won't you drop off of Howard's dissertation committee? After all the ways you've avoided service obligations, to be dragging your heels to stay on an engineering grad committee seems more than kinda out of character." In frustration, Leonard raked back the hair from his forehead.

"You're wondering if I've been replaced by a pod person," Sheldon interpreted with a small smile. "The answer to that is, of course, no."

"Suuuuure," Leonard mumbled under his breath.

Sheldon smiled knowingly. "If you'd stop and think for a moment, you'd realize that by staying on Howard's thesis committee, I'm doing him a favour."

"Huh?" Leonard crossed his arms determinedly, pulling his grey hoodie almost closed over his faded penguins t-shirt.

"As usual," Sheldon said with a small, sad sigh, "you fail to follow my clear and obvious logic." He glanced again at the loading screen on his monitor, then turned back to Leonard.

"As scholars, we want our work to be the best that it can be, don't we, Leonard?"

From his perch against the kitchen island, Leonard shrugged slightly. "Sure?"

Sheldon nodded. "All right, then. Now that we've established a minor premise, let's move onto a major premise. Would you let someone you know put out something grossly wrong or inferior?"

Leonard thought on this for a moment. "If I didn't like them, say. Like Kripke. I might then. But, otherwise, no."

Sheldon nodded again, more emphatically. "All right, then. While Howard has been low man on the totem pole of my friendship many a time, he's not in the same category as-" small shudder "-Kripke. I would feel, erm, at least some small regret, were Howard to be humiliated in print."

Leonard nodded. "Okay." He waited while Sheldon regarded him with seeming patience that was, honestly?, mostly unnerving. There was a reason that the grad students all ran screaming from Sheldon's classes, after all.

"So?" Leonard finally asked, fingers of one hand rising to fiddle at his chin as he wilted under Sheldon's relentless regard.

"Isn't it obvious?" Sheldon asked with some surprise. "Do I really have to spell it out explicitly?"

Leonard glared at him. "Okay, consider me a moron. Just tell me, straight out and simply, why you're staying on Howard's doctoral committee?"

"Because I can see the enormous amount of work that Howard needs to put into his dissertation in order to make it a truly worthy project," Sheldon said brightly. "He is my friend, officially and all, so I am, in some way, obligated to see this through. To help him out, as it were."

With that brightly-voiced speech over, Sheldon smoothly rotated his chair back to facing the screen. He peered closely at the information there. "Ah, 28th in the log-in queue. The end is in sight!"

Leonard didn't consider the matter quite so settled as his roommate did, however. He cocked his head to one side, gaze drifting off toward the ceiling as he tried to process Sheldon's statement. "How is it helpful to shoot down his doctorate for years, maybe forever, just so it can be better? It just has to be good enough. And it's an engineering thesis, not a physics degree. How much can you really add to it, anyway?"

Sheldon turned away from the computer screen at the last question. "A silly question, Leonard, really. _I_, of course, can add volumes to the tiny little tidbits of knowledge that Howard's laughably basic mathematics skills have suggested in the work so far. Furthermore, I have to contest the entire concept behind the SHARAD detection system, in any case. I mean, it's obviously been surpassed by more recent understandings of low-frequency radar detection-"

Leonard interrupted, "But none of those new ideas have been implemented yet, Sheldon. Let alone are they on satellites that are currently in Martian orbit. SHARAD is what they've got and that's why I expect he came up with this topic with Dr. Arlin who's been consulting with the European Space Agency on SHARAD since 2003."

Sheldon glared at his roommate. "Smartypants! Still, given the clear advances of the basic science in the last seven years, I cannot condone going forward to defense with this data alone. Howard should be preparing for the next generation of shallow radar detections with his work, not simply working with what he has!"

Leonard felt his forehead begin to pound in a painful way. "But that's exactly what he's supposed to be doing, Sheldon. That's his topic. That's his parameters. That's his purpose!"

Sheldon's nose wrinkled in obvious distaste. "You say tomato, I say "model improved low-frequency shallow radar data analysis." And, since I'm on the committee, a service obligation that you pointed out I was failing to provide to the university, what I say goes. Howard will deal with it. Don't worry. And now that I'm finally logging into the Closed Beta of Cataclysm with my Undead Warlock, I bid you adieu."

Leonard levered himself away from the counter and retired to his bedroom, muttering in disgust. This was certainly not going to be easy for any of them. The thought of scrawling something on the walls with blood-red paint seemed just a little more appealing than it had a few hours ago.

* * *

Knock. Knock-knock-knock. Knock.

"Come in," Leonard said with some exasperation and when nothing happened, he stormed around his desk to open the door. Raj stood in the hallway outside, glancing furtively up and down the hallway.

"I said 'come in'," Leonard reiterated with a touch of bitterness.

"Sorry, man," Raj said. "I was just keeping an eye on for Sheldon."

Howard, already camped out in one of Leonard's office chairs, rolled his eyes at Raj's malapropism. "Keeping an eye out, Raj."

"Whatever," Raj replied dismissively. "I spend three hours on video chat with the family last night and my brain's still processing from the other side of the planet." He tugged down his argyle sweater vest as he grabbed the other guest chair near Howard's.

"Shouldn't you lock that?" Howard asked, with an anxious look toward Leonard's office door. "In case Sheldon, you know. . . ."

Leonard sighed, pushing himself out of his desk chair yet again. He turned the door lock with a heavy click. "There. Happy?"

Howard rolled his eyes. "I may never be. Man, Sheldon is going to be the death of me. We have to come up with some way to get him off the committee or I'll be defending when I'm applying for Social Security."

Raj pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Don't candidates have a right to have a say in who's on their committee?"

Howard bobbed his head. "Well, normally yes."

Leonard leaned forward across his desk. "And your situation isn't normal how?"

Howard look uneasily, left to right. "Okay, well, I was trying to get the attention of Sherry, you know the really hot brunette who works in the grad office? So I was going in there every week with a change to my committee until they, well, banned me from the office and Dr. Arlin made me swear that I would not request any further changes to my graduate committee."

Raj whistled softly. "Whoa. Bad move there!"

Howard turned sharply in his chair. "Wow! And to think I never realized that until now. Thank you, Dr. Obvious."

Raj's brow furrowed angrily. "Look, if you'd kept us all in the loop, we could have helped you out with some of the worst problems. Instead, you had to hide everything and look where that got us!"

Leonard cut in before their argument could get any more heated. "Look, blaming is not the point. We're here to brainstorm a solution to Howard's problem. And if Howard can't get a committee change put through, well, maybe somebody else can? How about your supervisor, Howard?"

Howard shook his head sharply, making his mop of hair slap back and forth with his firm denial. "Nope, right now he only wants to get this done and get me out the door. He has a sabbatical coming up. . . ."

"Does he know about Sheldon's plans for 'significant revision'?" Leonard asked, lifting his fingers to emphasize the scare quotes of the last phrase.

"Even if he did," Howard said, "he's just so ready to be gone, he'd probably put my thesis on the back burner until his sabbatical's done."

Raj leaned forward. "What about if one of us puts the request in. I mean, we're faculty. Certainly we could have a role here."

Leonard appeared impressed, if slightly skeptical. "That's not a bad idea, Raj, it's just, well, how would we do that?"

Howard nodded excitedly and seemed to swell in his seat. "That could work! Leave the organizing to me. I know where all the forms are posted online. There's one for committee changes that I have on my hard drive. If I just get you to fill it in and get one of you to drop it off, we'd be good."

Raj frowned. "I don't know, Howard. Isn't the grad office onto you and all your changes? They might wonder why one of your friends is coming in to change the committee yet again."

Howard grudgingly nodded his agreement. "Yeah, that could be right. We need to get someone they wouldn't pay any attention to. Just take the form from and file the changes."

Leonard leaned back in his chair, staring off into the distance. "One of the staff?"

Howard shook his head again. "No. All the office workers in your department and mine know the grad people really well. And they know about my, erm, status with Sherry. So we couldn't get that by them."

Raj piped up. "We need someone who looks like they could work here, in the office, but doesn't, and is willing to play along."

"An actor?" Howard suggested. "That seems a little over-elaborate, if you know what I mean."

Leonard smiled broadly. "Actually, I think it's exactly right." Looking at the clock on the wall, Leonard nodded decisively.

He pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and pressed a few buttons. "Penny? It's Leonard. This is your break, isn't it?"

He nodded slightly, avoiding Howard's and Raj's eye contact as Penny obviously spoke at some length.

"I'm sorry, I didn't think it was stalkerish to just remember your work schedule. Anyway, I was calling to ask if you could do a little favour?"

Again, he paused while Penny responded. Neither Howard or Raj could hear what she was saying, but the volume of garbled sounds piping out of the phone got a bit louder.

Leonard winced and held the phone slightly away from his ear. "Not _that_ kind of favour, Penny. It's a favour where we'd ask you to use your acting skills. All very professional, though."

The volume of Penny's voice, filtered through the phone, dropped dramatically. "It's to help Howard out. We need someone to deliver some forms to the grad office and appear, well, entirely unremarkable. Because, apparently, they're onto Howard."

Leonard nodded again in response to what must have been a long response from Penny's end. "I'll tell him, just a minute."

Putting his hand over the phone's mouthpiece, Leonard leaned across the desk. "Penny says she'll do it-"

Howard shook his fist in triumph.

"Wait," Leonard said. "You haven't heard the terms."

Howard froze. "What does she want?" he asked.

Leonard stared intently at him. "She wants you to pay for six months of her internet bill, set up her own wireless router so she's 'no longer at Sheldon's mercy' and you have to promise that there will be no pinches, no pats and no 'yo mamas' for an entire year."

Howard stared intently into vacant space in front of him for ten seconds, then nodded. "All right, I can do it."

"He's in," Leonard said into the phone. "Look, are you free tomorrow? We can get the paperwork together and you can meet us on campus sometime. We'll show you the rest."

Howard raised a hand. "Wait. Tell her to dress 'frumpy'. Like an office worker. Not to dress like a student or they'll ask for her student ID and we'll be busted."

Leonard repeated the request and, after listening a bit more to Penny, fixed his friend with a stern gaze. "She says it's eight months, now."

"All right, all right," Howard grumbled. "Just let's get this thing done!"

* * *

"Hi, guys," Penny's voice carried clearly from the entry to the Holliston parking garage. "That's three dollars you owe me for parking, too, Howard."

Leonard returned her greeting. Raj ducked and ventured a tentative wave. Howard groused under his breath about her picking the two hour parking when one would've done but at Leonard's stern glare, stopped.

"Well, Penny," Howard said approvingly as she stepped out into the sunlight, "you must be a better actress than I thought."

Penny smiled triumphantly. "Why's that, Howard?

"Well, look at you," Howard enthused. "You really look the part. I mean, the brown dress is a bit shapeless, that's so 'academic', and the glasses? Perfect touch. Someone might almost mistake you for a faculty member but you took care of that with those sandals, not Birkenstocks like a prof or grad student would wear."

Penny's grin widened and she gave a mock curtsey. "Nice to know that I've impressed you."

"Yeah," Howard continued, looking her up and down. "I said to myself, 'that Penny, she knows how to do dumpy because, oh!, have you seen her in those sweat pants, and a bit trashy sometimes with the cut-offs and tanks, but frumpy?, now, that might be a stretch."

Leonard covered his eyes with one hand while Raj cringed backward as Penny's expression morphed from flattered to outraged.

"Um," Howard said warily, realizing, too late, the mistake he'd made, "I'm sure those are all just part of your talented acting repertoire, actually, because you're so endlessly fascinating."

"Stuff it, Howard," Penny said sharply. "And it's a full year, now."

"Huh?"

"The internet that you're setting up and paying for. Twelve months. Any more screw-ups and it might be a whole new laptop, so be careful," Penny warned.

Howard mumbled, shaking his head unhappily. Raj slapped him sharply on the back of the shoulder as if to say "shut up!"

Leonard anxiously rolled the folder he was holding, then, realizing this held the paperwork they wanted Penny to smuggle into the grad office, carefully flattened it back out.

"Um, okay Penny, what we need you to do is to take this folder over to the Grad Studies office. It's on the second floor of the Student Services building, right here. Just go up to one of the staff and tell her you have to drop off this form," Leonard explained, shoving the folder toward her.

Penny contemplated the folder briefly. "What if they ask where I'm from and who it's for?"

Leonard had an answer. "Just tell them you're dropping it off for one of the secretaries in engineering and it's for some grad student. They'll assume you're a floating temp. Probably won't even look at it until later which'll be perfect."

Penny nodded. "Okay, sounds easy enough. I'll be right back."

She sashayed toward the entrance deliberately, looking back over her shoulder once with a satisfied smile that seemed to say 'frumpy? In your dreams!' and the three men watched her walk with reflexive fascination. As soon as she disappeared into the doors, Raj slapped Howard really hard on the back.

"Ow!" he wailed. "What was that for?"

Raj glared at him. "You were an asshole, Howard. You hurt her feelings."

Howard looked his buddy up and down. "Who died and made you Mr. Sensitive New Age Guy?"

Leonard chuckled at that, but changed it to a cough when Raj glared at him. Adopting a sober expression, he, too, turned disapprovingly toward Howard. "You had to admit that she got pretty decent revenge there."

"Who?"

Sheldon's voice caused the three to jump.

"What the-?" Leonard squawked. "What are you doing at this part of campus, Sheldon?"

"Oh, I just have some paperwork to drop off at grad studies! Must hurry since I told them I'd have it in before noon," said his roommate, cruising by. "Wolowitz. Koothrappali." He nodded at the other two as he strode rapidly past them.

"Oh, shit," Howard said, glancing at the other guys. "Whadda we do now?"

Raj appeared hunted. "Run?"

Leonard began backing up to the parking garage entrance. "Let's just hang out back here, where it's a bit dark."

"Good idea," Howard said as he and Raj scrambled after Leonard. They waited and waited. And waited some more. And then campus security showed up. And an emergency response vehicle from which two EMTs jogged hurriedly into the center.

"Oh, shit," Leonard breathed, fading further into the background, trying to figure out if he could make an escape but knowing that Penny would hunt him down if he disappeared on her.

Within a few minutes, they saw a flustered Penny exiting the building beside an affable Sheldon. As he walked her toward the parking garage, they could just make out Sheldon's reassurance to the security staffers. "Don't worry, I'll make sure she doesn't cause any more trouble here. You have my word. Now, come along, Penny."

The pair nodded and returned to their vehicle.

Penny, meanwhile, was barrelling straight to the other three as if they showed up on a radar scope. "You, you, YOU!" she snarled, pointing at Howard, who stood as if transfixed by her anger.

"What?" he managed, wilting before the combined force of Penny's wrath and Sheldon's supercilious good humour.

"You know what," Penny said. "I've just been banned, _banned_, from the Caltech Student Services building for life because, apparently, I was somehow aiding you in breaching a restraining order on behalf of that poor woman in the grad studies office who fainted when she saw the name on your forms."

"Really," Sheldon said, chidingly, "you shouldn't have done that, Howard."

"Done what?" Howard protested. "_I'm_ not supposed to enter the office, sure, but I didn't think that extended to anyone else-"

Penny's angry confirmation earned a strangled laugh from Howard. "Oh, geez, well, I'm really sorry, Penny. If I'd known. . . ."

Sheldon stepped closer, giving Howard a censorious glare. "If you'd known, if you'd thought, Wolowitz, you wouldn't have tried these shenanigans. I heard from Penny what you were trying to do, get me off your graduate committee for some foolish, petty concerns. And you sent that nice young lady in the grad studies office into a fit. The medics were still there when we left. Poor thing. If only you'd been wise enough to leave well enough alone, but with the evidence I've seen in your thesis so far, I think we'd all have to agree that wisdom isn't exactly one of your strong points, either. Now, I have another project to tend to so, good day."

Penny, on the other hand, lingered, with a meaningful glare in Howard's direction. "Why didn't you tell me there was someone in there for whom the words "Howard Wolowitz" is apparently a cue for panic attacks?"

Howard shrugged more in an attempt to make himself smaller than to answer her question. "Um, well, because I hoped you wouldn't see her? Yeah, I used to try to get Sherry to go out with me and maybe I went a bit too far when I rewired the webcam on her work computer to connect directly to mine at the lab but I was just trying to get her to notice me."

Penny snorted. "Well, she knows who you are now. Me, too. Do you have any idea how humiliating it was to be photographed by campus security and then escorted out?"

Howard nodded.

Penny rolled her eyes. Of course he would. "I mean, for me?" she demanded.

"Um, very, very, VERY sorry?" Howard squeaked.

"I want a new laptop and my ISP for a year. Plus cable. HBO. Everything." Penny fixed Howard with a stern glare.

"Coming right up," Howard managed bravely as she shoved past him, heading up into the parking garage to retrieve her car.

"Well, that went badly," he muttered once she was out of sight.

Leonard's laugh was a sad bark. "I don't think there's a word that's strong enough to describe how badly that went."

"Cratered?" Raj offered.

"Deeper," Leonard insisted.

"Molten cored?" Raj countered.

"Maybe," Leonard conceded.

Howard raised his arms to gesture skyward in despair. "Why me?" he implored.

Leonard shrugged. "Why any of us?" At Howard's annoyed glare, he hurriedly added. "So this didn't work. We still have time. And options. We'll figure out something."

"Or you'll spend three years reworking your thesis to Sheldon's satisfaction," Raj added.

"Great," Howard moaned. "Just great."


	4. Chapter 4

"Hey, Leonard," Raj said eagerly as he quickly strode up behind the theoretical physicist standing just outside the departmental office late on the next Monday afternoon. Raj's blue windbreaker was zipped up high against the unseasonable rain showers that'd been plaguing the campus, making a plastic zip-zip sound with every stride he took.

"Hey, Raj," Leonard replied absently, sorting through the stack of office mail in his hand.

One ominous manila envelope marked "Urgent - Personnel" caught his eye. "What's this?" Leonard asked.

"I don't know," Raj said.

Leonard rolled his eyes at the unhelpful response while he stopped ripped open the sealed envelope. "I didn't expect you to, I was just speaking aloud."

"Oh," Raj said, rocking on his heels as Leonard pulled out a stiff sheet of paper. "Bad habit."

"I guess," Leonard responded absently. "Hey, what the hell is this?"

Raj stepped closer so he could peer at the letter. "It appears to be a memo from the administration saying that your employee benefits and research space are forfeit unless you attend the equity workshop this coming Friday and Saturday as well as an OSHA one next week."

The astrophysicist patted Leonard sympathetically on the shoulder. "Too bad."

Leonard slapped the paper against the rest of his bundle of mail. "They can't do that," he growled.

Raj shook his head chidingly. "Looks like they just did. Too bad. But, well, you know, your time and all, I'm sure. These things just happen."

Leonard reviewed the memo. "Hey, it's got your name on the cc field. Better go check your mailbox because I bet you've got one of these, too."

Raj grabbed the memo out of Leonard's hand. "No way. Uh, just let me run back to the mailroom and grab mine. I'm sure you're wrong!"

Leonard stood there, shaking his head as he stared at the memo in his hand. Eighteen hours of his time devoted to workshops on university policies that had nothing to do with his work? He'd been avoiding these for years, but somehow they'd tracked him down. And the threat of losing his benefits and research space was just scary enough to force anyone into these workshops. Much worse than the usual threat of "a letter in your file" he usually received.

"Damnit!" Raj's voice boomed from down the hallway, shortly to be followed by the man himself. "This is an outrage! A trampling of my civil liberties! I can't believe it."

Leonard took a little perverse pleasure in his friend's pain. "Ah, too bad, Raj. But, you know, maybe it was _your_ time."

Raj snorted and sneered at Leonard. "Go ahead, mock my pain. Just for that, you're not invited."

"Invited to what?" Leonard challenged.

Raj leaned in conspiratorially. "I came up with a great plan to cheer Howard up. I told him to meet me outside. I'm going to take him to the movies tonight."

"Alright," Leonard said, feeling a bit excluded. "That'll be nice. What're you going to see?"

"The new _Twilight_ movie," Raj confided.

"Really?" Leonard spluttered. "Isn't that, like, a chick flick?"

"Precisely," Raj said proudly. "There we'll be, the only two men in a theatre packed full of hormonally raging women-" His voice petered off at the somewhat daunting image he was painting. With a theatrical throat-clearing, he shook it off.

"And see?" Raj continued, removing his blue windbreaker to reveal a black t-shirt layered over a long-sleeved shirt. The shirt was blank except for a frothy white text proclaiming its wearer was part of 'Team Edward.' Looking down at his revealed shirt, proudly, Raj chortled. "The girls are going to love this. I mean, why wouldn't they? Edward is dreamy, you have to admit. If I'm on Team Edward, they're going to know that I'm the guy for them."

Leonard stifled a chuckle. "No, I don't think so."

Raj appeared about to fight for his character's reputation when a similarly clad figure appeared through the far doors.

"Hey, buddy," came Howard's voice. "What's taking you so long. We're going to be late!"

"You're, erm, excited about seeing _Twilight_?" Leonard asked, his tone evidence of patent disbelief.

"Excited?" Howard said as he strode up. "I'm prepared to be the luckiest man in Pasadena tonight."

When Raj flashed him a betrayed look, Howard elaborated, "We'll be the two luckiest men. See?" Howard unzipped his jacket to reveal a black t-shirt, layered over his green long-sleeved shirt, adorned with the slogan 'Team Jacob.'

"Cool, isn't it?" Howard asked.

Leonard couldn't help but laugh. "Um, well, no, actually."

Howard scoffed at Leonard's mockery. "Laugh while you can, but we'll be having the last laugh when we're fighting off the fangirls with sticks after they get warmed up by those vampire and werewolf boys on the big screen. They'll be putty in our hands!"

Leonard continued to chuckle as they hurried away from campus although his good mood faded as he regarded the memo still clenched in his hand. "Equity workshop on university policies," he muttered in a sarcastic tone. "Just peachy."

* * *

"Oh my gosh. Howard, Raj, what happened?" Penny was still in her Cheesecake Factory uniform, holding a bag of groceries against her hip while she fumbled for her apartment key with her free hand. All of that was forgotten as she stared at the bedraggled pair who'd just bolted up the stairs to stand on the landing outside Leonard and Sheldon's door.

"Oh, god," Howard breathed. "It's just too scary. We need to get inside somewhere it's safe. Now!"

Raj pushed the guys' apartment door open and waved the other man in with an urgent gesture.

Penny followed before they slammed the door closed and twisted the bolt home. "What the hell is up?" she asked again, staring at the two breathless men in dishevelled long-sleeved shirts while, from the couch and the chair, Leonard and Sheldon did the same.

"Lost the t-shirts, I see," Leonard said cheerfully. "So, how lucky were you?"

Slumping onto the couch, Howard fought for breath enough to speak. "Lucky enough to live."

Penny placed her grocery bag on the overflowing coffee table. "Am I missing something?"

Leonard bestowed a glowing smile upon her. "They went to the latest _Twilight_ movie tonight, wearing 'Team Edward' and 'Team Jacob' t-shirts figuring they'd get lucky with some of the girls there."

Penny eyed them in horror. "Some of those fan girls are pretty young. You didn't get jailed for child molesting, did you?"

The two men regarded each other in shock. "We never even thought of that," Howard breathed. "It wasn't quite that bad. Close, though."

Raj nodded emphatically.

"What happened to your t-shirts?" Leonard asked.

"We ditched them outside the movie theater," Howard confessed. "We got no action at the show. It was a lot of teenagers-" he nodded to Penny "-and I overheard some women talking about the cute gay couple by which they meant us-" he gestured in outrage at himself and Raj.

"But that wasn't the worst," Howard continued. "No, outside the theatre, we ran into a local Joss Whedon fanclub on their way to mock _Twilight_. And, well, it appears that our 'Team Edward' and 'Team Jacob' t-shirts were like a red flag to thirty people wearing 'Team Buffy' shirts."

He shuddered. "We barely made it out with our lives, I'm telling you."

"I'll bet," Penny said, with barely feigned sympathy. "I hope you learned your lesson!"

"Yeah," Howard agreed. "Stick to cons to pick up fan girls. Buffy fans are easier to get away from in those crowds."

Sheldon sniffed from his accustomed spot at the end of the couch. "I wouldn't be so sure. They've got those stakes, after all."

"Sheldon's right," Leonard interjected. "I'd lay low for the next little while. Better to be safe than sorry. Anyway, we all have that equity workshop to 'look forward to'."

Howard and Raj glumly nodded in agreement. Leonard noticed that Sheldon didn't. "Sheldon, didn't you pick up your mail today? I thought everyone got one of those equity workshop flyers."

Sheldon's eyes opened wide. "I didn't get anything in the campus mail except for some paperwork from the grad office that I have to sign for, you know." He darted a significant look at Howard who sat stiffly at the other end of the couch.

Leonard didn't pursue the last part, focused as he was on the workshop's intrusion on his faculty autonomy. "That's strange. I got a flyer telling me I had to attend or forfeit benefits and research support. Raj got the same." The astrophysicist nodded in agreement.

Howard piped up. "The entire Applied Physics group also got served notice. Attend university policy workshops for the next two weekends or we're out of our lab space. We've had to scramble to get three staffers scheduled to do the workshops over this next week or we'd have to shut down the whole lab."

"Funny you didn't get a memo, Sheldon," Leonard said, turning to regard his roommate.

"Oh, mine must be delayed in campus mail," Sheldon said breezily. "Or maybe I'm in a second group. You know, they could be going in reverse alphabetical order!"

"Yeahhhh," Leonard responded but before he could probe further, Penny picked up the paper.

"I know OSHA 'cause we have that at work, but what's "university equity policies" anyway?" she asked.

"What are university equity policies?" Sheldon corrected automatically. As Penny opened her mouth to snipe back, he forestalled her. "Equity, from the Latin, aequitatem, meaning 'equality, fairness or symmetry'. In other words, policies to ensure that all members of the university community are treated fairly. Elementary and obvious but, apparently, some of us need refreshers on those things." His satisfied look roamed from Howard to Raj and onto Leonard.

"Hah-hah," Leonard retorted. "You won't be laughing when you get your marching orders."

"I'm sure I won't," Sheldon cheerfully agreed. "Until then, however? Sucks to be you."

From their glum looks, Penny had to agree.

* * *

"Was there ever such a complete waste of time?" Raj asked as he dropped onto the couch, letting his head roll back against the cushion.

"You said it," Howard agreed as he slumped on the seat beside him. "Hey, where's Sheldon?"

Leonard looked back from where he was poking around in the fridge, "It's after eight already. He's downstairs, putting in his laundry."

"Are you kidding me?" Howard groaned. "We lost the entire day to that workshop?"

Raj nodded glumly, his head rolling minutely on the back of the sofa. "And then some."

"Well, at least we stopped on the way to grab dinner from Siam Palace. There's nothing here, not even plum sauce," Leonard said, slamming the fridge door closed in disgust before grabbing some plates and cutlery.

"Nothing, like what's left of my brain after nine hours of workshops. And that quiz we had to pass before they'd let us leave? That was brutal," Howard responded.

Raj lifted his head minutely at the last. "Still, it was interesting. I never knew there were so many barriers to accessibility."

Howard nodded and pointed at himself. "Yeah, fifty years ago, a Jew wouldn't have been welcome at lots of universities."

Leonard took his seat near the couch and the three men began to dig into the takeout containers. "And women, today, still face a lot of problems. Not to mention handicapped-"  
"Ahem." Raj intervened with a significant look.

"Ah, yes," Leonard corrected himself, "differently abled faculty, staff and students. I had no idea that you're not supposed to pet seeing-eye dogs!"

Raj smiled a bit mistily. "I bet _The Good Wife_ would be right out there with those civil rights lawyers they mentioned, fighting for full accessibility."

Howard stared at his friend, incredulously. "That's a TV show. And she's a criminal lawyer!"

Leonard wrinkled his nose. "I don't really like that show. That one actress reminds me too much of my mother."

"Julianna Margulies?" Raj said incredulously. "In your dreams."

Leonard shook his head in negation. "No. The other one. And, just, please, don't go there. About mothers and dreams. Okay?"

Howard shuddered. "Leonard's right. I want to sleep tonight, not have nightmares."

"Whatever," Raj sniffed, clearly a little miffed. The apartment was eerily quiet except for the sound of three starving men wolfing down their long-delayed dinner.

"Guys!" Penny waltzed through the door. "Hi, there!"

"Penny," Leonard said with some surprise, seeing her in her work uniform. "Were you working?"

Penny looked down at the white shirt and yellow vest. "No," she said drolly. "I'm wearing this because it's 'Dress Like a Fried Egg Day'."

"Really?" Leonard asked weakly.

"No," Penny snorted in derision as she took Sheldon's seat on the couch, "I picked up a shift from one of the other waitresses. So, what's up?"

"You're brave," Howard said.

"Not especially," Penny said. "I just know that Sheldon's downstairs in the laundry room. He's running extra loads. Apparently this is a special occasion of some sort where he washes all of the bedding and the kitchen towels, so he's going to be there a while."

She looked at the mess on the coffee table and poked at the takeout boxes. "Anything to eat, here?"

"Not much, but help yourself," Leonard sighed. "Normally, I'd go grocery shopping on Saturday, but we were stuck in the equity workshops yesterday and today. Got behind on my work and we were starving."

"Oh," Penny said, "too bad. Wish I could make it up for you but there you go." She didn't sound too sincere but, then again, there wasn't much in the way of Thai food left for her to scavenge.

Howard opened his eyes hopefully. "You could make it up to me."

Penny rolled her eyes. "Seriously, Howard, we've known each other this long and you won't stop trying?"

"I'd have to be dead not to," he said, in gallantly breathless tones.

"That could be arranged," Penny replied flatly. She turned her shoulder so that she wasn't looking at Howard, but gazing directly at Leonard, instead.

"So, what did you learn at the workshop?" she asked.

Leonard scrunched his face up. "Lots of things," he started, but as Penny rolled her eyes, he tried to focus. "Did you know that gender equity policies require that there no university committee can be composed of only men or only women?"

Penny let out a barking laugh. "That must be pretty hard in situations like yours."

"What'd'ya mean?," Leonard asked.

Penny tapped her fingers on the arm of the couch. "You know. There are like, pretty much no women in the physics faculty. At least that I've seen."

Howard smirked. "Oh, come on. We have three. You've even met one of them. Leslie, or are you forgetting?," he said.

Penny turned to look at him with a sober expression. "No, actually, I wasn't," she said. She grinned sweetly at the end of the statement, letting her opinion of Leslie shine through clearly.

"Oh, I get it," Howard managed, snickering a little, himself before another interpretation occurred to him. "You know she and I went out, didn't you?"

"Uh-huh," Penny said. "And my point still stands. But seriously," Penny went on, as Howard frowned, "this equity policy's just words on paper. It doesn't mean anything. I mean, you guys have no women participating in lots of things. Like Howard's thesis committee, right?"

Raj's mouth dropped and then he leaned over to whisper in Howard's ear. "Stop it," Howard said, but it was clear from the stunned expression on his face that he was thinking the same thing.

Leonard was already up and out of his chair, going over to Sheldon's desk to leaf through the much-annotated copy of Howard's thesis lying beside the computer. "She's right," he crowed.

"Of course I am," Penny said genially, getting up from the couch to read the same names over his shoulder. "You'd think one of you guys would've noticed that at some point or another!"

Howard and Raj got up from the couch to crowd around Leonard at the desk. "This is great," Howard enthused. "We finally have a way to get Sheldon off the committee, for good and for real!"

"Wait a second," Leonard said. "That rule's just for general university committees. It wouldn't apply to a dissertation committee since they're about field specialization."

Howard chuckled. "_You _know that and _I_ know that." He glanced over at a wildly gesticulating Raj. "And _Raj_ knows that. But Sheldon missed the workshops so _he_ doesn't."

Penny turned an impressed gaze on Howard. "Why, that's pretty twisted, Howard. I didn't know you had it in you!"

He turned around as if to rush Penny with a hug but she raised one hand in warning. Howard sidestepped her with a shrug and did a happy little jump instead.

As he came down for a landing, the apartment door opened. Sheldon, with a large basket of neatly folded laundry, entered. He stopped and stared at gleeful Howard in some surprise. "What's he so happy about?"

Penny opened her mouth to explain but Leonard enveloped her in an awkward hug from behind with one hand over her mouth, rapidly overriding her half-spoken opening. "Sheldon! Howard's just happy because we had a great time at the workshop. He was telling Penny all about the great time we had. That's all," Leonard continued emphatically, "isn't it, everybody?"

Raj nodded in mute agreement, silenced, as always, by Penny's presence while Howard took the cue and ran with it. Leonard 'oofed' as Penny elbowed him, forcing him to release his hold on her. "You didn't have to lick my palm," he hissed.

Penny stared at him. "Did, too," she replied.

"Nyah," Leonard retorted, but with little real heat. The pleasant glow at having a way to get back at Sheldon after more than a week of nagging torments, he had to admit, was pretty good. He couldn't imagine how wonderful Howard was feeling at the prospect.


	5. Chapter 5

"Oh, look," Sheldon said coyly at lunch. "Here's the schedule for Howard's thesis defense committee meeting. Thursday at 10? Hmm, I suppose that I am free, although it's funny they didn't consult me, just posted this on the intranet."

Howard, Raj and Leonard exchanged conspiratorial looks as Sheldon laid the printout beside his lunch tray, on top of a small pile of paperwork he'd brought with him. "Yeah," Raj said, "but, you know, the administrative assistants are all in their own OSHA workshop today so probably stuff is just delayed. Like my immigration paperwork!"

"That's not good," Leonard said sympathetically. Howard nodded and patted Raj on the back.

Sheldon gazed at Raj censoriously. "Really, Raj, you should be more on top of things. Speaking of 'on top', I'm pretty sure that this casserole is missing the promised _au gratin_ so excuse me while I take my plate back."

The taller man rose from the table, heading off for another conflict with the kitchen staff while the other three worked through their cheeseless lunch trays without complaint.

"Dr. Hofstadter! Dr. Koothrappali! _Mr._ Wolowitz." Dr. Gablehauser loomed over their table with an affable grin.

"Hello, Dr. Gablehauser," Leonard offered. While the older man stood expectantly, he continued hesitantly. "What can we do for you?"

"Where's Dr. Cooper?" the department head asked, looking around the cafeteria.

"Oh, he's just getting his lunch fixed," Raj explained. "He won't be long, probably."

"No time for that," Gablehauser said. "Just tell him that I said 'Good work' on getting all those people corralled into these workshops. Without his clever plans, we'd have never gotten above the 10% compliance rate we've been stuck at for years. Now we're on target to be top in the faculty, maybe even university-wide."

"Wait," Leonard said, "you mean all those workshop notices were Sheldon's fault, er, idea?"

"Precisely," Dr. Gablehauser confirmed with an affable grin. "Personally, I never would have gone so far but Dr. Cooper said that was the way to get people to pay attention and it looks like he was right. He's a regular service star, now, between this big fix and that committee he saved our bacon on."

Leonard coughed while Howard looked up in alarm. "You didn't hear, Dr. Gablehauser? There was an equity problem with that committee so Dr. Cooper's off."

The senior professor appeared a little bit peeved. "He's off? Do I have to find another internal external? What an imposition-"

Leonard chuckled, "No, sir, nothing on your plate. The grad office made the replacement once the issue was raised with them, so everything's good now."

Dr. Gablehauser stared down his nose at Leonard with some indignation. "Well, at least I don't have to find a replacement committee member, but, still, I'd made all those changes to Dr. Cooper's annual review and now that's up in the air. Well! Must get back to my office and make note of that before my next meeting."

With that abrupt comment, he was off, just before Sheldon returned to the table with a plate of steaming casserole topped with unevenly melted cheese. "What did Dr. Gablehauser stop by here to say?"

Leonard, Howard and Raj exchanged careful glances. "Nothing much," Leonard said airily, leaning back in his chair as Sheldon carefully lowered his plate to the table. "Just commenting on what a big help your service work is turning out to be or something like that."

Sheldon darted glances at the three other men. "I suppose that serving on a doctoral committee is quite the onerous task. I'm just glad to be of assistance."

"Suuuuure you are," Leonard said before turning back to his tray.

Sheldon shot him a wary look but detecting no further signs of sarcasm, obviously wrote this off as one of Leonard's whims. When Raj started discussing the week's upcoming comic book releases, Sheldon was all too happy to add in his insights and the rest of the lunch passed with every sign of normalcy or what passed for it with these four.

* * *

"Dissertation committee day," Sheldon said with barely suppressed satisfaction. "I will finally have my say."

He carried with him that dogeared copy of Howard's thesis, plastered with Post-It notes and covered in red ink. Waving it in front of Howard provoked no histrionic response, however, obviously a disappointment to Sheldon.

The four men were all standing in the hallway outside one of the meeting rooms in the Arms Laboratory. Raj and Leonard had explained they were accompanying Howard "for moral support", an idea that Sheldon found plausible.

Still, he couldn't resist needling the engineer, at least a little bit. "I'm glad to see, Howard, that you've finally come to terms with my presence on your committee. Trust me, in the end, you'll see how useful it was to have a real scientist's perspective on these things."

Howard just grunted as he sat down on the bench outside the meeting room. Raj slumped beside him, pulling his messenger bag into his lap so he could pull out a book.

"_Breaking Dawn_?" Leonard asked, peering at the black, red and white cover. "Isn't that one of those _Twilight_ books?"

Howard shuddered, remembering their close encounter with the Buffy fans outside the theater, but Raj appeared rapt. "It's a moving love story, Leonard. Really, and Edward is just so romantic, taking Bella off on this honeymoon to a tropical island. . . ."

"Wait, wait," Leonard interrupted. "Isn't he, like, a vampire?"

Raj nodded. "That's why it's so beautiful."

The others just stared at each other in non-comprehension as Raj sighed deeply. "Look, I'll lend you the books so you can see for yourselves. But I haven't finished the fourth one yet, so if you'll excuse me."

Sheldon looked at his watch. "Quarter to ten. I'm optimally early so I'll bid you gentlemen farewell and go in to carry out one more critical part of my service application-"

He pulled on the meeting room door, opening it wide and staring inside with horror.

"Dr. Dumbass! Why am I seeing you here?" Leslie's biting tones carried cleanly into the hallway.

Sheldon rallied quickly, appearing more annoyed than flustered by her sudden attack. "You're obviously in the wrong place. Quelle surprise! _I_ am here for the meeting for Howard Wolowitz's doctoral committee."

Leslie looked down at the thick bundle of papers in front of her. "You've found it."

"Oh," Sheldon said, shifting uneasily from one foot to another. "I, well, wasn't expecting you here."

Leslie did a double take at this. From either side of Sheldon's lanky form, Howard and Leonard could see her broad, predatorial grin. "You mean, you don't know?" she asked. "This is priceless."

"I don't know what?" Sheldon responded huffily, hugging his copy of Howard's dissertation tight to his t-shirt clad chest. "Look, I'm the internal external for Howard's thesis, so I'm supposed to-"

"No you aren't," Leslie countered smilingly.

"Yes I am," Sheldon retorted.

"You were," Leslie said, "but not any more."

Sheldon shot glares at Howard and Leonard, standing just behind him in the open doorway. "Look, they may have convinced you that Howard wanted someone else to be on his committee, but I can assure you that I was assigned to this post and am prepared to carry out my duties no matter what tomfoolery they've gotten you involved in. So if you'll leave, we'll all save you some embarrassment."

This last was said as the three faculty members from engineering, Howard's supervisor and readers, lined up behind Sheldon, obviously waiting to enter the room.

Leslie wasn't prepared to back down. "Tell me, Dr. Cooper," she said with clear relish. "What do you know of the university's equity policies?"

Sheldon appeared taken aback by the unexpected question. "Well," he replied, stalling for time as he obviously sought for a pithy retort, "Equity, from the Latin, aequitatem-"

Leslie snorted. "I don't need etymology, I need an understanding of the university policy on harassment."

"Harassment?" Sheldon repeated, rearing backward slightly. "I have no idea."

"Of course you don't," Leslie responded instantly. "But those of us who attended last week's equity workshop have a deep and clear understanding of these principles and your placement on the committee has been identified as leading to a hostile workplace situation with regard to gender equity. Therefore, the graduate studies department asked, and I agreed, to replace you on the commitee as of Monday. Which you would have known if you'd picked up your office mail this week, Dr. Cooper." The last was said with biting sweetness as the other faculty members filed in around him and Sheldon stood, dumbfounded, in the doorway.

"I don't, I mean, what's going on?" he said, struggling thoughtlessly against Howard's and Leonard's gentle handling. They coaxed the taller man across the hallway and to a seat on the bench beside Raj who barely noticed their presence, wrapped up as he was in his book.

"Well, you see, Sheldon," Leonard began, "we figured out something last week, thanks to those equity workshops that you'd roped us into."

Sheldon fixed Leonard with a shocked look. "You know about that?"

"Oh, yeah," Leonard said with a forced air of casual indifference while, inwardly, he gloried in Sheldon's dawning awareness that things in his life were going seriously awry.

Howard took over the explanation while Sheldon sat, shell-shocked.

"You see, my committee's all male and the equity workshops were quite enlightening in showing that this kind of single-sex grouping is precisely the way in which the patriarchy replicates itself," Howard couldn't suppress a smug smile at Sheldon's continuing bewilderment.

Leonard took a little pity on his roommate. "In other words, we pointed this out to the dean who amended Howard's committee so that there's a woman on it. Leslie agreed to take over."

Sheldon rose from the bench, but it was clear that his thoughts were elsewhere. Before he could get too far, Howard pulled the much-battered copy of his thesis out of Sheldon's slack grasp. "You won't be needing this."

"Uh-huh," was all Sheldon said as he retreated.

Leonard and Howard looked at each other with wide grins.

"Score!" Leonard said, before assuming a look of some concern. "Look, I know that was satisfying to see Sheldon go down in flames but aren't you just going from the frying pan into the fire with Leslie. I mean, you two didn't part on the best of terms."

"Pot? Kettle? Black!" Howard retorted.

"Seriously," Leonard said.

Howard grinned. "Well, seriously, all I had to do was tell Leslie that Sheldon wanted nothing more than to tear down my dissertation and make me redo it. You know how she is about Sheldon. That turned her into my number one champion, it seems."

"Huh," Leonard said. "Really?"

"Really," Howard confirmed with a smug grin.

Leonard appeared less cheerful, a small frown knitting his brows. "It's just that, well, what happens when Sheldon figures out that we fooled him. Sure, Leslie replaced him on the committee, but that wasn't required by any equity or harassment policies."

Howard shrugged, seemingly unworried. "Sheldon'd have to actually attend the workshop and you know how good he is at avoiding things. I'm pretty sure we're safe. "

Leonard nodded uneasily, unable to escape his feelings of doom.

"Oh, oh, you guys," Raj said, wiping a tear of excitement from his cheek. "You won't believe it!"

"Raj, have you been paying attention?" Howard asked with some asperity. "We just put a stake through Sheldon's undead heart and rescued my thesis from his clutches."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Raj interjected. "No, what I mean is about the story, here. In _Breaking Dawn_. You'll never believe it."

"Believe what, Raj" Leonard asked, feeling quite at sea.

Raj smiled beatifically. "She's pregnant with his half-vampire baby. Isn't it the most romantic thing?"

* * *

"Oh, really," Sheldon groused, as he unlocked his office and saw a pile of envelopes and small mailers stacked untidily on his desk.

Hanging his two-tone jacket up so that the sleeves draped with perfect symmetry, he stalked around to his chair, sitting down in front of the messy assortment of university mail that one of the staffers had decided to deliver to his desk rather than leave in his box.

"This is just so annoying," he grumbled as he began to work his way down through the paper and cardboard.

Near the bottom of the stack, one large, manila envelope labelled "Urgent - Personnel" caught his eye. He opened the seal and pulled out a memo.

"Dr. Sheldon Cooper, you are notified that unless you attend the university Equity Policies and OSHA workshops as scheduled, your access to university benefits and research space, as an employee of the institution, will be suspended until you are deemed to be in compliance with the requirements as mandated by the state and federal accrediting bodies-. What?"

He flipped back to look at the address on the envelope and on the letter. While he tried to correlate this puzzling development, Dr. Gablehauser walked by Sheldon's open door.

"Excuse me," Sheldon called out, "Dr. Gablehauser? Dr. Gablehauser?"

The department head stopped and retraced his steps, poking his head around Sheldon's door. "What is it, Dr. Cooper?" he asked with visible impatience. "I have a meeting with possible donors."

Sheldon picked up the memo. "It's just this, summoning _me_ to those equity and OSHA workshops."

The older man's frown dissipated. "Oh, yes! It was a good thing that Dr. Winkle noted you were one of the few faculty members who'd missed last week's workshops. We're close to having one hundred percent compliance, finally, on this front, thanks to your bang-up efforts at getting the rest of your colleagues on board. Well, except for Dr. Newton, of course, who's off at the rehab hospital, and one other, but we were able to get the office to put together a personalized workshop for the two of you, so I'll be able to count this as completing your service obligations for the academic year."

Dr. Gablehauser looked down at his watch and appeared on the verge of taking off, again, but something drove Sheldon to ask one more question. "Well, besides Dr. Newton, who missed the last workshop?"

Dr. Gablehauser smiled. "That'd be Dr. Kripke. So the two of you will have a wonderful time at the workshops. I heard that they're introducing a role-playing session this week. Won't that be fascinating? Oh, well, gotta run!"

All the way over at Arms Labs, perhaps even at the Cheescake Factory, Sheldon's anguished "NoooooooooooOOO!" rang in the ears of astonished listeners.

* * *

**EPILOGUE**

Beckman Mall was packed with bodies, eager to see friends and family members receive their honours at the Caltech Commencement. A sizable number of doctoral degrees were being awarded at this session. Sheldon, Leonard and Raj had joined the faculty procession, resplendent in their individual institution's doctoral robes although neither of the others could really compete with Leonard's MIT regalia in red velvet and dove grey.

In the swarm of candidates, Howard stood proudly in his own Caltech robes, dark blue with velvet trim and gold piping, waiting for his turn to be hooded. As the faculties were reading off candidates in alphabetical order, that meant a long wait in the sweltering heat. Finally, his turn came to step up and his name was announced.

Howard waited proudly as the blue and gold trimmed hood was draped over his shoulders. He bent his head forward to make the task easier on the tired senior faculty member when, from out of the crowd, a shrill woman's voice howled, "Ho-ward? Why are you slumping? Stand up straight!"

Howard whipped his head around to stare furiously into the crowd. "Are you happy, crazy lady?" he shouted before looking back and forth at the assembled dignitaries. "I, uh, I don't know who that could be. Honestly!"

"See," Sheldon whispered between clenched teeth. "If you'd let me stay on the committee, instead of pulling that absurd stunt to replace me with that harridan, we all would've been spared this."

"That's better!" Mrs. Wolowitz's distinctive voice voice shrieked. "Now smile!" Howard did so with patent painfulness, preparing to hurry out of the limelight. Behind him, among the seated faculty, Leonard dropped his face into one hand, wincing sympathetically at his friend's embarrassment.

The hectoring voice wasn't finished, however. "And you boys! Howard's school friends, up on the stage. You, there, in red! And the tall one! And the sweet little Indian boy! Don't forget, we're all having brisket for dinner. Seven sharp!"

Raj smiled blissfully at the thought of Mrs. Wolowitz's mouth-melting brisket. Sheldon stared off blindly, whether unaffected or simply feigning it, Leonard couldn't tell, as he slumped in his own seat and groaned. Maybe Sheldon _had_ been right.


End file.
